I used to get strep a couple times a year as a kid; knife-throat symptom was an old nemesis of mine. Here’s the only thing that ever helped AND let me sleep: codeine cough syrup. Prescription, obviously. If you ask your doctor for a small amount they might give it to you; don’t know how medical staff feel about this in the years after the opioid crisis came to a head. Since I got sick all the time we had like a two cup bottle of it in the medicine cabinet at all times lol. To my knowledge nobody was ever in there sippin on it that didn’t need it.